Well Beyond the Waves
by SombraAlma
Summary: Kate, and the beginnings of a promise fulfilled. "It's not so surprising, she'll tell herself later, it's not a betrayal, when it takes several months for her to even remember it."


**Title: **Well Beyond the Waves**  
Rating: **PG**  
Disclaimer: **Don't own them; just borrowing.**  
Summary: **Kate, and the beginning of a promise fulfilled. _Again he's there, pressing against her body and whispering in her ear. "I have a daughter." And then on her other side, a smooth hand on her arm, a woman's voice, so close she can feel the breath on her cheek. "I'm pregnant. It's his."_**  
Spoilers: **Up to the season 4 finale.**  
Notes: **The title is from Iron & Wine's song "Promising Light."

* * *

It's several months back in LA before she even remembers it.

She's far too busy learning to be a kind-of mother to a fussy baby who misses (she assumes) his _real_ mother and her milk, the crash of waves on a hidden shore, and the voices of people he'd come to know, at least in the way an infant has knowledge. Her voice is not one he knows, not well. Charlie's voice sang to him, Sawyer's voice read to him, Hurley's and Claire's and Sun's soothed him to sleep. Kate's voice coaxed him out of his mother's womb, but that was a lifetime ago, in baby time, and she knows she is essentially as unfamiliar to Aaron as the bustle and noise and smog of the big city is. And yet, she's all he has. (And she ignores the small voice that reminds her that he is all _she_ has, too.)

She's also far too preoccupied with staying out of the suddenly intrusive spotlight, and while she's no stranger to hiding out and disguising her identity, she finds it nearly impossible now – a quick trip to the market, wearing sunglasses and a baseball cap, has her surrounded almost immediately. Everyone wants the inside scoop, the parts of the story they're not getting from the nightly news. "What was it _really_ like," they want to know, and then they want to touch the baby, the miracle Oceanic baby, who cowers away from the unfamiliar hands and smells and sounds. He starts whimpering, curling closer to _her_, finally, and she's never been so grateful to him, for giving her an escape. "He's not used to so many people," is her standard reply as she moves away, and she invariably forgets some essential item she'd needed at the market in the first place.

So it's not so surprising, she'll tell herself later, it's not a betrayal, when it takes several months for her to even remember it – or, more accurately, for her subconscious to bring it to the forefront, back into reality again.

* * *

_All she can hear are the whirring helicopter blades; her hair is whipping around her face and she's having trouble seeing, too. And all of a sudden he's next to her, thigh pressing into hers, and his voice is in her ear. Just a whisper, and she doesn't know how she's even hearing it but she is, and she doesn't know why he's telling her this, so she tells him so. And he doesn't answer, but then his hands are on her face and he's kissing her, long and deep and hard, almost painful. And it's not like a cliché where everything else fades; no, she feels everything, still, the urgent fear and the whipping wind and his whisper echoing in her head. Then he jumps, and she finds she can't scream._

She wakes, drenched in sweat, her heart pounding in her chest, and she still wants to scream. Instead, she stumbles out of her bed, down the hallway to Aaron's room. She watches the baby sleep, peaceful in his crib and more innocent than she's ever been, his arm flung over his head, and she adjusts his blankets until her heart rate slows down to something resembling normal.

_I have a daughter,_ his whisper still rattles around in her head, and she looks down at the baby who's _not_ her son and she senses the first tiny inkling of something that feels like hate. She presses her fingers to her lips, as if her will alone can keep it inside, and she leaves the nursery on trembling legs.

He is too innocent for her.

She thinks, panicked, that this phantom _she _(his daughter, daughter, daughter) is too innocent, as well.

But she has broken so many promises, already.

* * *

She spends the late night and early morning researching (she dares not go back to bed). And in the later morning, she calls a private detective, one who advertises his discretion and respect for privacy. After all, she will only tell him what he needs to know to find her; she knows the rules, the script of this lie they live now. And privacy and discretion come at a price; she tries not to choke at the number some nameless secretary reads off to her (for one _hour?_), but she remembers her newly overflowing bank account and says, "Yes. Okay."

It's fitting, almost, that Oceanic will be footing the bill when – if – she finds his daughter.

At their first meeting, the detective looks uncomfortable and even disapproving at Aaron's whimpers and cries. "Colic," she lies apologetically, patting the baby's back and pacing with him in front of the detective. Over the baby's noise, she weaves a story about meeting a man on the plane before it went down, and hands over the photo – an Australian mug shot – she'd printed off of a memorial website.

"He called himself Sawyer, but the news keeps calling him James Ford. Guess it was a nickname." She bounces Aaron in her arms, shushing him softly, wishing she had a low Southern drawl with which to soothe him. "He told me about a daughter he had...He hadn't been in contact with her in a long time." She's being as vague as possible, and really, half of this is guessing. "He said she was in Albuquerque."

* * *

It's another few months, and another meeting with the detective. He comes armed with a folder full of papers, and he watches as Aaron crawls around the living room, happy, adjusted, _hers_, this time. He passes Kate several photos of a tanned little girl playing in a front yard, somewhere in New Mexico.

"Her name is Clementine," he says, and Kate nods as if this isn't like seeing a ghost – long blond hair, dimples, and she'd know that smirk anywhere. _Oh, my darling, oh my darling._ And there's a mother's name, a phone number and address, paper clipped to the photos, but she's focused on the last picture in the bunch.

"Cassidy," she says, and she stares until it's seared onto her mind's eye: Cassidy and his daughter, laughing in the sun.

* * *

_All she can hear, still, are the whirring helicopter blades and the waves below them. Again he's there, pressing against her body and whispering in her ear. "I have a daughter." And then on her other side, a smooth hand on her arm, a woman's voice, so close she can feel the breath on her cheek. "I'm pregnant. It's his." And Sawyer grabs her roughly away from Cassidy, kisses her like he's trying to take her breath. "Just do it, Lucy." Then he jumps, and this time, Kate screams. A little girl is screaming with her._

She's jolted awake by their screams; her face is wet and her entire body trembles. She wraps a robe around herself and sits at the kitchen table, endless cups of coffee keeping her company until the sky is light and the dream is just a memory.

When it's no longer too early and Aaron is eating Cheerios in his high chair, she unfolds the paper, dials the number carefully. While she waits, she looks at the photos again – she sees a different picture entirely, different dimples and long blond hair, someone else's smirk, but familiar.

She jumps when a woman answers the phone.

"Cassidy?" A swallow. "It's Kate...Austen." A clearing of the throat. "Lucy."

There's silence for several moments, then – "I know who you are."

"I, um...I have a message. From Sawy-- From your daughter's father."

She wants to ask her what he was like, if his hands had always been so possessive, his smile so disarming, his demons pushed so far down into his soul. She wants to know if Cassidy dreams of him, of the last time she'd seen him, the last time he'd kissed her like he'd never let her go.

But instead, only: "He wanted her to know that he's sorry."

_Dreadful sorry, Clementine._


End file.
